Vladimir Lenin was born in 1870 as Vladimir Ilich Ulyanov in Simbirsk. His father, Ilya Ulyanov as a prominent educator in Russia and was regarded to be a nobleman, a privilege that extended to his six children. Vladimir was the third child in the family. His mother was of Jewish origin. His family had their descent from different cultures and nationalities such as Jewish, Russian, Swedish, Kalmyk and Volgan German. He used the pseudonym Lenin for security or work purposes.
Lenin’s life was full of controversy because of his radical and revolutionist policies. He was once expelled from college, where he was a law student, because of his radical ideologies. He graduated later from law school in 1891 as an external student. The turning point in Lenin’s life came in 1887 after the death of his father. His brother was executed in 1891 and his sister exiled for plotting to assassinate Tsar Alexander iii. While at St. Petersburg University, Lenin developed an interest in Karl Marx’s work and ideology. He practiced law as a defense lawyer in Samara, central Russia. Later in 1893 he moved back to St. Petersburg where he got involved with radical groups and Marxist societies. He was arrested severally for his radical. He was exiled to Siberia in 1895 for the same reason. He met his future wife in exile. While in exile, Lenin taught his Marxist ideas to the public, something that annoyed Russian authorities. Through his famous newspaper, “Iskra”, Lenin used propaganda and other approaches to win over the confidence of Russian people.
He returned to Russia in 1905 when the political scene was undergoing revolution Russia had just lost to Japan in the Russo-Japanese War. During the revolution, Lenin took advantage to win extra support. He also developed his ideology of using peasants, workers and soldiers to dictate and run his revolution. Even when he moved to Switzerland, he used foreign sponsors to help his collaborators in Russia. The uprising led to Tsar Nicholay giving in to the public pressure hence; the birth of the Russian parliament. This symbolized the birth of Liberal bourgeoisie, which was highly despised by Lenin.
Between 1907 and 1917, Lenin moved across Europe to interact with other socialists, such as the Prague Party Conference held in 1912. Lenin was advocating against imperialism and presenting to people how practical a socialist revolution would benefit people of Russia. Lenin’s role in World War 1 was indirect. He believed that Germans attacking Allied forces was like imperialists attacking one another. He was against Russia attacking German because he thought this would affect his strategy. Therefore, he started advocating for the imperialist war to be turned into civil war. He wanted people to fight for equality among all classes. His attempt at the Zimmerwald Conference to pass the transformation of war against imperialism to a war of classes failed because the majority pacifists voted against it.
Towards the end of World War 1, Lenin took advantage of the revolution to go back to Russia. He took the opportunity to launch the socialist revolution. He oversaw the overthrowing of the weakened Tsarist regime. At the beginning of his socialist regime, he met opposition from some of his allies such as Georgy Plekhanov. His influence over the public helped him rise to power. However, after assuming power, Lenin became a dictator who focused solely on the implementation of socialism. He did not care much about his country people. Still he was flexible enough to adopt different economic policies when the socialist approach failed to spur the Russian economy to growth. He was known as the father of Marxism-Lenism, a socialist approach that was used to run the Russian economy during his reign. He also laid the foundation for communism in Russian.
References
Institut marksizma-leninizma (Moscow, Russia). (1943). Vladimir I. Lenin: a political biography. Baltimore: University of Michigan.
Lenin, V. I. (2002). Revolution at the Gates:. Moscow: Verso.
Lenin, V. I. (2004). The State And Revolution (reprint ed.). Moscow: Kessinger Publishing.
